Columnist for The Age

I HAD an epiphany of a most unpleasant kind during the 2012 AFL grand final.

It happened because someone working for, or on behalf of, the AFL saw fit to impose upon a great sporting occasion by adding sound effects. Of the banal sort that might otherwise be heard in a computer game, they ceased only when the ball was bounced and the game was actually in motion. What was thereby blotted out was the grand final's great intangible - the atmosphere of the day.

It had never previously occurred to me that anyone would presume they had the right to interfere with the grand final in this way. No club had suggested the change. There was no push among football supporters for it. There had been no public discussion about whether this was a good idea and something that people actually wanted.

No, it happened because someone charged with marketing or promoting the AFL saw the grand final as an opportunity to do just that. In a column I wrote at the time, I warned that we were starting down a slippery slope that would lead to each goal being met with blasts of loud music. What is being lost is the right of individuals to enjoy the game in their own way.

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AFL football cannot be characterised solely as corporate sport, but what happened on grand final day was an expression of corporate thinking. But the AFL doesn't own the game. They are servants of the game. The question of who owns football is a very important one and something that now needs to be discussed. Who is serving whom?

If you want to see corporate values in sport at the cutting edge, follow the English Premier League. A recent example - Arsenal. Arsenal is not like the AFL - it's owned by shareholders, the biggest of whom is American sports tycoon ''Silent'' Stan Kroenke. Relative to other cowboy capitalists who have bought into the EPL, Kroenke seems a remarkably decent individual. He didn't fund his purchase of two-thirds of the club's shares through debt and then require the club to pay off the debt for him, as happened - scandalously - at Liverpool and Manchester United.

But Kroenke was booed at the Arsenal AGM when he refused to say that he would not take a dividend out of the club at the end of a financial year when Arsenal sold its captain and best player, Robin Van Persie, to Manchester United. In an interview, Kroenke said the matter of owners taking money out of sports clubs was simply not an issue in the US. But why is it assumed that in matters of sport the US is the future? It is simply one version of the future which we are free to choose depending on whether it suits our needs and values.

Now Englishman Paul Sergeant has waltzed into town and, in his capacity as the new boss of Etihad Stadium, announced that the AFL should look to the EPL and NBA basketball for inspiration. He was quoted as saying: ''The whole experience of going to an NBA game blows your socks off because they make use of the arrival experience, the video boards, the monitors around the venue, the PA system.''

Blows your socks off?! For a garish, one-dimensional, routinely over-the-top spectacle, the NBA certainly leads the way. Sergeant's rationale could be used to argue that the National Gallery would get more visitors if it converted into a franchise of Disneyland.

The AFL has taken a series of decisions which have made televised broadcasts of games increasingly attractive as against going to matches. Now, in a bid to have their cake and eat it too, the game is at risk of being seriously debased.

For 150 years, Australian football has enjoyed a popularity that is, by global standards, a phenomenon. For 150 years, the excitement induced by the game has been self-sustaining. Now people with no proven interest in the history and culture of the game are moving to change it before our eyes. If followers don't stand up and make their voices heard, it's going to happen.

152 comments

AFL does not need the fanfare an noise of NBA, NFL or other American sports. The game itself has enough excitement, action and atmosphere which make it such a great experience.

The sports that use the noise are games that are boring and need the noise to build the atmosphere. I have been to sports that deploy the noise and found it to be very annoying. The game is a great spectacle and fast moving with no time outs so there is no need for this 'faux entertainment' to keep the fans amused.

Let retain our unique game and say no to the noise. I think it will drive fans away reather than attract them.

Commenter

ThaiPie

Location

Thailand

Date and time

November 15, 2012, 2:40PM

Has the AFL ever taken the ridiculous step of asking us, the supporters who go every week or used to, what we actually want? It's easier to pay some self important middle manager an exorbitant salary to tell us what we want and what we'll bloody well be satisfied with isn't it? And if we don't like it we can go elsewhere and proportionately that's exactly what we're doing! The AFL running football as a sport should come first, as a product to be sold second or at least it should.

Commenter

rext

Date and time

November 15, 2012, 7:40PM

Agreed. Leave footy alone. It's great the way it is.

Commenter

Mark

Location

St Kilda

Date and time

November 15, 2012, 7:52PM

What it reminds me of is canned laughter on US sitcoms. Put in for those who don’t get it, and need to be told when to laugh.

Commenter

CK

Date and time

November 15, 2012, 10:06PM

@ThaiPie, actually I've notcied in the past few years that the atmosphere at games is decreasing! The 'roar of the crowd' at the first bounce is almost gone, the excitement of a fight or big hit is now non existent and goals are only warmly applauded like a drive to mid off for a quick single. AFL football has become more of a frustrating afternoon than actual enjoyment.

Commenter

Craig

Location

Mordialloc

Date and time

November 16, 2012, 6:50AM

I'm really hoping I'll wake up soon and discover that I merely dreamed about this article. How has this taken two months to get out? There were 100,000 people there and not one of them has thought to get this atrocity out into the mainstream?

I'm moving back to Melbourne next year after 13 years and was hoping to get back into footy but don't think I'll bother now, this is a bridge too far.

Commenter

Cathy Little

Location

Perth

Date and time

November 16, 2012, 9:20AM

I couldn't agree more. It is so patronising of spectators - that we cannot possibly think our own thoughts without having to be "entertained" with some mindless loud music or advertising. We've all paid to enter the ground. Why do we have to endure all the aural and visual pollution that increasingly goes with it? As for needing to look to the US? What? We have our own culture. Please stop treating spectators as mindless and lacking the social skills to talk to each other. Staying home and watching the game on TV gets more appealing each season.

Commenter

Demynw

Location

Melbourne

Date and time

November 15, 2012, 2:44PM

Hear hear! We, the grassroots members & supporters own the game, Mr AFL, not the corporates & certainly not the mindless Americans who need such constant stimulation 'cause all their sports suck!

Commenter

In the Bloods

Location

Lake Oval

Date and time

November 15, 2012, 4:07PM

The AFL needs to back off and remember it's the fans the own the game, the AFL does not own the fans. Reserved seating is an example of how they're wrecking the future health of the game for short term money, because it denies opportunities for kids, it breaks down the spontaneous community building that happened with the old suburban grounds and leaves the whole experienced diminished. It's like watching a movie now, instead of participating in a cultural ritual. It's too late now though, they're dependent on the revenue and the genie has escaped the bottle. They're stuck in an exploitative mindset. Given population growth it's hard to see how attendance at the game will not end up becoming the domain of the shallow end of the middle class and their love of everything tacky and meaningless.

Commenter

Anton

Date and time

November 15, 2012, 6:38PM

Couldn't agree more with everyone here. Anton, Martin Flanagan, Rational Bomber, denymw, thaipie, everyone.Everyone has covered what I would have tried to say.I will only add that as well as the reserved seats the exploitative mentality also schedules games on sunday evenings in the middle of winter and the middle of school/work committments..not to mention increasigly nights nights nights. Every prelim is going to be night because the TV brings more money to the piethat is eaten by everyone but us....the cash cow. Too bad kddies, oldies, coldies...anyone. Do the AFL & corporate heavies (times how many of them now) walk up to Flinders St and wait 30 mins to start the train ride home at 8.30 or 9pm on a Sunday night in July August with two or three little kids? They want us to stay at home obviously because we have to. What a shme. But I will never be blackmailed into Pay TV. As for the adverts and insultingly stupid noise we get pre game, halftime, etc, some idiotic screaming of the score when we already know it and just want to clap the players off and what not...maybe even relax for a while and have a chat. Heck when I'm by myself I used to read at halftime. Those were the days. We shouldn't put up with it because, as Matin suggests, in the end they will wreck it to the point of no return. Too many people are being turned off. We have paid big money to be there, to be members etc, we should not be assaulted by corporate leeches at every turn. We are smarter and more igified than that. We need to turn over the Commission more often and the members of clubs should get part of the vote.